Boulder’s International Migratory Bird Day: Walk in the Wild

As an intern in the Boulder, CO Environment for the Americas (EFTA) office, one of my main responsibilities is to coordinate Boulder County’s International Migratory Bird Day: Walk in the Wild event which is held at a local wetlands wildlife habitat area. I am happy [and relieved] to report that the event went great! This was the 4th year of the event and based off the reports from all the previous years, it seems that our event here in Boulder grows more and more every year.

Some of our favorite comments about the event include:

Mommy, let’s go find some more birds! (a newly engaged birdwatcher)This was a great event. (Parent)

Thank you guys so much for putting on a wonderful event! It was great fun for our who family and we will definitely attend again next year–Mom of two

Thank you for hosting such a fun event. My scout had a great day helping and my daughter enjoyed all the activities! (Parent)

Overall, preparations for this event started around this past January and some of the details I needed to coordinate were:
-Confirming educational organizations to sponsor an education station at the event. We had nine organizations (including EFTA) in attendance!
-Obtaining donations from local stores to support us in our raffle…the raffle items we had this year were GREAT (including Patagonia fleece sweaters, Colorado Rockies tickets, Denver Zoo tickets, and many gift cards). The main goal of the day, besides hosting an outreach event for families to learn more about the nature and birds at Walden Ponds, is to raise funds to support habitat restoration in the form of wildflowers, shrubs, and trees.
-We are still counting, but so far, we have raised over $1000!
-Advertising the event to ensure people actually attended!
-This was was one of the most nerve-racking details to confirm. The morning of the event we had all the EFTA staff members, education station sponsors, and birds….then we just were anxiously awaiting people to show up! The start of the event at 9am rolled around, and sure enough, families and birders started strolling up the trail, yay! Much to my relief, all of my efforts in advertising the event through our local newspaper (the Daily Camera), online event calendars, and facebook weren’t futile! We actually had an attendance of around 300 people…the most to date over the 4 years of hosting this event.